Ontario Community Newspapers

Port Perry Star, 26 May 1977, p. 4

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Editorii Moving On Somebody once said that an editor is a guy who "sorts the news and separates the wheat from the chaff, then goes ahead and prints the chaff. = Well, after over two years overlooking the shores of Lake Scugog, this Separator of Chaff will ton, to be exact, as feature writer-photographer with the Burlington Bureau of the Hamilton Spectator. Long a repudiator of crass materialism and exponent of the Good Life, | feel a bit awkward admitting that the move is for little more than pecuniary reasons. Ly | mean, who would move to all that pollution, Paved Paradise, The Mob, for anything else? You don't work at a job in a community without taking a bit of it with you, and Port Perry has been no exception. Editing the STAR has put me closer to people than ever before, and the experience has been rewarding and eye-opening. Unlike many other journalists who begin in weeklies and move-to the larger dailies, my experience has been the reverse. | firmly belleve now that the STAR has provided an experience | could have gained nowhere else. Perhaps the best example of this community's warmth has been the reaction of the staff.here at the STAR, all people who | have worked with for more than two years. Upon learning of my new job; the extent of their Immediate surprise, well-wishing, congratulations and sad regrets at parting for both me and my family, will truly never be forgotten. Former Editor Returns : It Is with regret the STAR announces this week that John Gast, editor with the paper for the past 2v2 J years will be leaving to take up a position with the Hamilton Spectator. We are sure John will be missed by his many friends and acquaintances, but wish him every success in his new. position. Commencing with the next Issue of the STAR, we are also pleased to announce that John B. McClelland will take over the duties of editor and news reporter. Many area residents will remember John, as he was editor of the STAR during 1971:72, before accepting a job'as assistant editor with a large weekly serving the city of Yellowknife and all of the Northwest Territories. John has travelled extensively throughout the north of Canada, as well as coast to coast, and has a SR 2 RRs: CE aS Her name is Doris, and she'll be about sixty years of by John Mack look for higher-yield grainfields elsewhere. Burling- age. Time has been kind to Doris, perhaps because she has kept a very lively curiosity about the world. I've never seen Doris but I imagine she is about five feet four inches in height and possibly one hundred seventy-three pounds in weight, a trifle heavy, but Doris is not what one would call the active type. I think her eyes will be set quite close together and her iron hair, cut short, will hang lankly over her forehead. Her most notable feature, if it can properly be called a feature, is her left hand. The fingers twist as though they were always reaching out to curl around something. Her right ear is almost twice the size of the left. -- x Today Doris is just a shadow, really a ghost of what she was yesterday. Yesterday Doris was the person who listened in to everyone's telephone conversations on our party line. Doris shared her telephone with nine other families, and she shared their calls too. Not for Doris the fake, phoney world of television's soap operas. Doris had a world of real life drama right at her finger-tips, or maybe that should be 'ear-holes'. But the cruel, unthinking, inhuman big business bulldozer, Ma Bell, has given everyone of us our ewn telephone line. ; Can you imagine Doris' desolation, the devastation, her total, absolute misery of never, ever knowing how anything turned out? Can you imagine sitting, looking . at an empty now rings only for thee? I am appalled that no one has given one single thought for Doris in all this. I everyone of us. is entitled to his private phone, but to cut Doris off all at once seems less than fair. After all, in any other form of addiction society understands the princple of weaning, just a little bit at a time. Perhaps eight this week, seven the next, then six and so on, but cold turkey is 80000000 cruel. All things considered, I'll miss Doris. You know, how it is sometimes, you dial the operator, and it rings, and rings, and rings. It's almost enough to you crazy. Well, at these frustrating moments I talk to . She doesn't talk back, after all on my , phone call that would be somewhat forward, but she breathes. : telephone knowing that when it rings, it- 4 I'll say, "Maddening, isn't it?"', while the phone is ringing, and Doris breathes back. And I'll say, "What on earth can the operator be doing?" and Doris sighs sympathetically. I even tried once to sort of involve Doris in the general frustration, I said, "Notice the rhy ythm as it rings, Doris. A sort of 'RINGINGINGING' and 'RINGINGINGING'. I went on this way until I heard Doris's phone fall and I realized I had hypnotized the poor creature and she had fallen asleep. Falling asleep is quite understandable as Doris has some very late vigils. Some of our make very, very late telephone calls. Most inconsiderate! We, at our | house, never call after 11 p.m. as Doris might very well have to waken up, or maybe even miss the whole thing. I don't know whether Doris is honestly addicted to listening or whether she is addicted to telling what she's heard. There is great dignity and great drama at the weekly meetings Doris has at her house. Every Tuesday at 10:00 a.m. all the housewives gather while Doris reigns over the teapot and the coffee pot. Her stories are better than "Mary Hartman, Mary - Hartman" because somewhere in the rapt audience you know a listener is squirming and turning plisriaisly hot and cold, knowing it's her story that is being told and praying that Doris will avoid letting anyone know who the 'participants are. This is why everyone avoids giving that smacks of offence, because if they do, then Doris will turn to the culprit halfway through the story and say, "Isn't that Generally s Doris is most . She tells just enough t everyone knows it's one of them but which of them is the puzzle, and the speculation is half the fun. ; But Doris is working on some involved cases right now, such as the young couple up the road who may be visited much of Europe. His interests include sports film, live theatre and writing. He will be moving to Port Perry with his wife, Joan, and child, as soon as a suitable location can be found. : We, at the STAR, welcome John back.to Port Perry and hope that his stay. this time 'will be an even longer and more enjoyable one. gt Lucid Comment Perhaps the most perceptive comment made at Monday's meeting of Scugog Township Council was an observance by Coun. Richard Drew about the establishment of conservation authorities. "He noted that at least one official claimed the authority does little more than reflect the wishes of the politicians that make up its governing body. "'Doesn't that go against the best Interest of conservation -- having politicians in control?" This writer has heard countless explanations of why conservation efforts are loosing ground, why rivers keep getting dirtier, and air keeps getting more polluted. - None have been as lucid as Drew's. I

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